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Microsoft Corp. is working with the OPC Foundation to enable almost any IIoT scenario using interoperability between the millions of OPC UA-compliant applications and equipment. Microsoft will enable IIoT users to connect manufacturing equipment and software with extended support of OPC UA's open-source software stack. Microsoft’s extended support for OPC UA spans its IoT offerings from local connectivity with Windows devices to cloud connectivity via Microsoft Azure. Integration with Azure IoT allows customers to easily send OPC UA data to the Azure cloud, as well as command and control OPC UA devices remotely from the Azure cloud.
Pepperl+Fuchs broke ground June 2 on its new U.S. distribution and engineering center in Katy, Texas, near…

While routine build-up and clogging in process applications is annoying, process scaling is more persistent, causes unplanned downtime and increases costs in many industries. It's typically composed of calcium carbonate, wax, grease or similar…

Just as you can't have too many friends, level measurement applications can't get enough ease of use, reliability and safety. Thanks to increasing process industry needs and user demand for them, these are the three unifying priorities that drove…

Our panel of experts explore best practices for dealing with buildup on chemical seals of a differential pressure flowmeter.

Q: We have a venturi flowmeter with 3-in. flanged pressure taps and flanged chemical seals with capillary tubes in a 44-in. vertical pipe (Figure 1). The fluid is hydrocarbon (polymeric) gas. The problem is that the chemical seal diaphragms often…

A Control Design reader writes: We have several temperature, pressure and flow sensors on a new medical-device cleaning skid that we are developing. These instruments are connected to a PLC as 4-20 mA inputs, and there is also a 4-20 mA output used to control a pump motor speed. A recent failure of a flow sensor brought the process skid instrumentation to my company's quality manager's attention. He asked how we know that the temperatures, pressure and flow are accurate, and how do we know that we are cleaning properly.
I've been tasked to write a procedure for troubleshooting, calibrating and testing the 4-20 mA instruments on the skid. I can probably stumble through this, but what are some best practices for troubleshooting the analog…

Control's Monthly Resource Guide brings you the latest online resources on a variety of process control topics.

MULTI-PART WEIGHING
This four-section webpage by Omega Engineering covers "Weighing Applications," "Weighing System Design," "Installation and Calibration" and "Specialized Installations." The whole group is located at…

FOPDT model has demonstrated utility for controller tuning rules, for structuring decouplers and feedforward control algorithms.

A first-order plus deadtime (FOPDT) model is a simple approximation of the dynamic response (the transient or time-response) of a process variable to an influence. It’s also called first-order lag plus deadtime (FOLPDT), or “deadtime” may be…

'To the degree networks and standards can provide easy, consistent and seamless access to device-resident controls, the vision of truly distributed control may finally dawn upon us.'

Every compressor in the facility went down at once that day, when a PLC redundancy switchover didn’t transfer in time. The engineers didn’t know that each P453 remote I/O processor had a dip-switch-selectable timeout setting—if it didn’t…

A Control Design reader writes: We have several temperature, pressure and flow sensors on a new medical-device cleaning skid that we are developing. These instruments are connected to a PLC as 4-20 mA inputs, and there is also a 4-20 mA output used to control a pump motor speed. A recent failure of a flow sensor brought the process skid instrumentation to my company's quality manager's attention. He asked how we know that the temperatures, pressure and flow are accurate, and how do we know that we are cleaning properly.
I've been tasked to write a procedure for troubleshooting, calibrating and testing the 4-20 mA instruments on the skid. I can probably stumble through this, but what are some best practices for troubleshooting the analog…

Most public utilities deliver basic power and water, and God bless them for doing it. However, a few go beyond their essential missions, and seek to further enhance the overall well-being and prosperity of their communities.
One of these is…

Advanced control on fuel and steam can control emissions while saving millions.

It’s no secret that advanced process control (APC) has played a major role in the process industries for many decades. However, while many organizations focus only on major process units, there’s often an untapped opportunity to do more, and…

Our readers tell us who they think delivers the best technology in our industry

There's knowledge in our readers. That's why every year we ask our loyal audience to help us determine which automation service providers offer the best products and brands they can rely on to get the best combination of performance, ease of use,…

Just when it seems like today’s sophisticated motors and drives can’t possibly add more efficiencies and capabilities, engineers conjure up new tricks and refinements, followed by end users and system integrators who materialize new settings and…

Control's monthly guide brings you invaluable industry information to stay up to date on the latest trends and developments.

THE CLASSIC VALVE BOOK
The fourth edition of the 295-page classic text, "Control Valve Handbook," by Fisher Controls International and Emerson Process Management reports this classic text has been a primary reference since its first printing in1965.

Control's monthly guide brings you invaluable industry information to stay up to date on the latest trends and developments.

THE CLASSIC VALVE BOOK
The fourth edition of the 295-page classic text, "Control Valve Handbook," by Fisher Controls International and Emerson Process Management reports this classic text has been a primary reference since its first printing in1965.

Just when it seems like today’s sophisticated motors and drives can’t possibly add more efficiencies and capabilities, engineers conjure up new tricks and refinements, followed by end users and system integrators who materialize new settings and…

Actionable information is essential for the effectiveness of the 'loop,' as it is for closed-loop control and open-loop alarms.

When I sat down in my office this morning, I was greeted by the operations manager, who pointed out an entry from last night’s operations log: “Did you see? The boiler steam vent is in manual because the pressure reading whacked out and made the…

Actionable information is essential for the effectiveness of the 'loop,' as it is for closed-loop control and open-loop alarms.

When I sat down in my office this morning, I was greeted by the operations manager, who pointed out an entry from last night’s operations log: “Did you see? The boiler steam vent is in manual because the pressure reading whacked out and made the…

Actionable information is essential for the effectiveness of the 'loop,' as it is for closed-loop control and open-loop alarms.

When I sat down in my office this morning, I was greeted by the operations manager, who pointed out an entry from last night’s operations log: “Did you see? The boiler steam vent is in manual because the pressure reading whacked out and made the…

Our readers tell us who they think delivers the best technology in our industry

There's knowledge in our readers. That's why every year we ask our loyal audience to help us determine which automation service providers offer the best products and brands they can rely on to get the best combination of performance, ease of use,…

Visualizing and contextualizing safety data can have a positive impact on productivity and compliance.

"Information is one thing, but safety information is quite another," says George Schuster. He should know. He’s charged with business development for the Global Safety Team of Rockwell Automation and has seen many plants and factories begin to…

How to deal with the constraints of putting access points in hazardous areas.

In an ideal world, it wouldn’t be necessary to worry about explosive atmospheres. Unfortunately, plant environments are far from ideal, with most process plants being about 80% Class I, Div. 2 (Zone 2) and another 10% Class I Div. 1 (Zone 1), so…

Key is to learn as much as possible to make digital technologies safe, secure and successful in process settings.

As usual, and I’m sure this is true for many of you, this year’s autumn season has been a frantic dash of work, deadlines, sleep deprivation, indigestion and suspiciously arthritic stiffness. In my case, this means covering all sides of the…

With today’s network technology, even Ethernet and wireless are almost always fast enough.

As automation professionals, one issue we have about control loops is ensuring we're able to support real-time control. Historically, when Ethernet was 10 MB/s and there were multiple drops on a single port, collisions were a significant concern and…

With today’s network technology, even Ethernet and wireless are almost always fast enough.

As automation professionals, one issue we have about control loops is ensuring we're able to support real-time control. Historically, when Ethernet was 10 MB/s and there were multiple drops on a single port, collisions were a significant concern and…

Because they're the crossroads, nexus and Grand Central Station for sensor signals and data arriving and requests and actuation instructions departing, it's a big help that I/O and terminal blocks are more flexible and capable than ever.

Compact, Remote I/O for Zone 2/Div 2
LB System remote I/O has more power in less space with high-performance, compact modules plugged into a backplane. Energy-saving power management and low-power dissipation allow maximum packing density. With the…

Be just 33 seconds more productive each hour, and the savings mount quickly.

Rockwell Automation previewed its new, forward-looking App Platform for mobility at this week’s TechED conference in Orlando. While focused first on redefining smartphone use on the plant floor – with the aim of making individual workers more…

Control’s latest State of Technology report delves into the many aspects of power systems of interest in process plants.

From sourcing and ensuring uninterrupted flows of clean electricity to monitoring, regulating and metering generation and consumption throughout a facility, process automation professionals who want a smooth-running, efficient and reliable facility are well advised to seek and control power.
This anthology of recent articles delves into the many aspects of power systems of interest in process plants. Remote and wireless systems are speeding development and standardization of energy harvesting and improved battery systems.
Line-powered supplies that used to only transform electricity and maybe offer surge protection are now monitoring and measuring current and voltage profiles, implementing alerts and alarms, and sending data up to…

Greg: Here we take advantage of the chance to talk to Bill Thomas, who provides a great lesson of how to succeed in advancing capabilities and opportunities in his career and the control systems for which he was responsible. His career and the…

Control's monthly guide brings you invaluable industry information to stay up to date on the latest trends and developments.

AT THEIR BEST, ALL THE TIME
ExperTune’s white paper, “How to Improve Performance of Process Control Assets,” by George Buckbee, P.E., describes the practice of real-time asset performance management, shows how to get assets to perform at their best all the time, and demonstrates the value of integrating these tools for a performance picture that delivers financial results. It’s available here.
ISA / www.isa.org
ANALYZING, PREDICTING PROBLEMS
This 57-minute video, “Avoid Equipment Surprises: Predictive Diagnostics for Oil & Gas,” is presented by Joe Dupree, GE Automation and Controls, and users from NiSource Gas and Alyeska. They demonstrate condition-based monitoring, predictive analytics and other tools for evaluating…

Steve Christian remembers the days—not too long ago—when production schedules were printed on sheets of paper and distributed to operators at his plant, who would manually twist valve handles to send the Ragu sauce tomato slurry from one kettle…

Advanced control on fuel and steam can control emissions while saving millions.

It’s no secret that advanced process control (APC) has played a major role in the process industries for many decades. However, while many organizations focus only on major process units, there’s often an untapped opportunity to do more, and…

Find and slay the dragons lurking in the typical safety instrumented system.

Cybersecurity is a growing concern in the process industries, and a number of good articles have been written about it for industrial control systems (ICS)—many full of doom and gloom. Here, we will divide the ICS into two parts: safety…

Big data can only help users if they understand what it is, how it can affect their controls and processes, and how they can use it to optimize operations.

Similar to any new technology emerging on the process control front, big data can only help users make better decisions if they understand what it is, how it can affect their controls and processes, and how they can use it to optimize operations.

Our readers tell us who they think delivers the best technology in our industry

There's knowledge in our readers. That's why every year we ask our loyal audience to help us determine which automation service providers offer the best products and brands they can rely on to get the best combination of performance, ease of use,…

How do vendor web sites stack up?

Is it easy to find the information you're looking for on vendor web sites, or do you get lost after the first dozen clicks? Heres a summary of the results of a recent survey on how supplier web sites measure up.

ARC and CONTROL jointly surveyed automation end-users to determine what is important for customers when it comes to automation supplier web sites and how the suppliers measure up. Is it easy for customers to find the in-formation they are looking for, or do they get lost after the first dozen clicks? Heres a summary of the survey results.

Does a Vendor Website Matter?Web sites have evolved to the point where they are the primary outward facing presence for automation suppliers, both for new and existing customers. Public supplier web sites have manifold purposes, ranging from public rela-tions to technical support and e-commerce. Many end-users reported that large corporate websites, such as ABB, GE, Honeywell, Siemens and others were less easy to use than end-user-targeted websites. This is almost certainly because of the dominant role of these sites in providing public relations and investor relations data, rather than technical information.

Good Content and Ease of Use RuleIts a no-brainer that content and ease of use would rate pretty highly among automation supplier customers as key criteria for web sites. More than 75 percent of total non-supplier respondents rated content and ease of use as being very important or extremely important. This only highlights the growing importance of automation supplier web sites as the primary means of communication between the supplier and their customers.

Good content is important, but what constitutes good content? For most respondents, product specifications and technical data are of primary importance (See Figure 1). Documentation and software downloads were important to close to 23 percent of respondents. Product configuration capabilities also ranked high, with a weight of close to 10 percent. What these statistics indicate is that most of the customer visits to supplier web sites are probably their existing customers looking for support data that is relevant to products that they already have rather than potential customers looking for information about a prospective purchase.

FIGURE 1: WHAT USERS WANTIt is clear what end users want from a supplier website. What is not clear is whether suppliers are listening.

This does not preclude, however, the importance of the web site as a tool for attracting new customers. Product and services selection and application tools, for example, were ranked third in importance with a weight of 12 percent. Information on industry-specific solutions also carried a high ranking of more than 10 percent, which could also be a potentially powerful attractor for new clients.

What is also reflected in the good criteria list is the relative lack of importance of the e-commerce function. Plac-ing orders ranked last in level of importance, accounting for less than a percentage point of weight in the total rankings. This could reflect a couple of key trends in the automation market that distinguishes it from other indus-tries.

First, automation solutions often contain a high degree of customization depending on the industry, application, environment, regulatory requirements, and so on. This high level of customization does not lend itself well to the point and click approach to purchasing products on the Internet. This statistic also reflects the conservative nature of automation market end users, particularly in the process industries.

Many of the key accounts that conduct e-commerce with automation suppliers do so through customized portals that have a highly secure connection, and not through public web sites. However, we must also point out the high volume of business that automation-focused e-commerce sites are doing, such as Omega Engineering (more than 50% of Omegas order volume is now online) and the automation portal on E-Bay. This suggests that end-users who want information go to the suppliers web-sites, and some of those wishing to purchase do go to dedicated e-commerce sites.

Second, a good search engine was ranked as the most important criteria for ease of use (See Figure 2), and can be a real timesaver when you need quick support information on a specific product. For many end users, the search engine, if it is easy to access and use, is the first place to go for information. The number of clicks it takes to get to the infor-mation you need is probably not that obvious to you until you realize youve been clicking for five minutes and still havent found what you are looking for, so it was no surprise that minimal clicks was the number two criterion with a weight of close to 26 percent. Having the web site structured around the product categories offered by the sup-plier, carrys a weight of 24.5 percent.

FIGURE 2: THE ULTIMATE SUPPLIER WEB SITEEnd users find agreement over what a good website should contain, and how it should be organized.

Think Global, Act LocalRespondents were split when it came to the preference for a single global site versus country-specific sites. Most customers want to see what the suppliers capabilities are in their specific country, particularly in developing economies such as China and India, but the need for global corporate information and the presentation of a single face to the customer is also important.

The divisiveness among respondents on the global versus local issue was reflected in the many comments we re-ceived for this question. One respondent remarked that there should be a single global web page from which the user can navigate to country-specific web pages. Another remarked that they hated country-specific web sites be-cause it made them wonder what they were missing on the other country web sites. This same phenomenon has occurred within some supplier companies, where the local organization creates its own web site to share in-depth data with clients within its region, but these independent web sites are usually not shared with clients from other countries. Management within the supplier company itself may be unaware that rogue country-specific web sites exist within their organizations.

How Much Information is Too Much?Respondents were equally divisive over their views on obtaining only the specific information they need versus being exposed to information about the suppliers other products and services. Almost 54 percent of respondents stated that they like to see a wide range of product and service information, while the rest preferred to see only the specific information they needed. This response is interesting for several reasons. If close to half of the respondents prefer to see only the specific information they need, it follows that they also know what they are looking for before they go to the web site. This only underscores the importance that suppliers must attribute to existing customers coming to their web sites looking for product and technical support information.

Of course, there is also a great opportunity for cross selling among automation suppliers. Most of the large automa-tion suppliers have diverse businesses that include not only automation systems, sensors and actuators, but also products that would normally be considered outside the scope of traditional automation, such as electrical equip-ment, building automation systems, and material handling systems. According to the results of this survey, at least half of customers seem to be open to the idea of finding out more about what the supplier has to offer them outside what their initial interests may include.

Suppliers and End-Users AgreeHere are some clear website goals for supplier websites:

Have an information-focused website, different than the investor relations website of the parent company.

Have a site that is easily searched by a site-wise search engine, and is easily spidered by outside search engines.

Make your website navigation as intuitive as possible. One respondent said, I don't count clicks - if it takes twelve, but each click was intuitive, that's ok by me.

Keep your information technical and actionable.

Keep your site updated and fresh.

Survey Respondents

ADMITTEDLY, THE survey is a relatively small sampling of the automation community. We received a total of 79 re-sponses from non-supplier clients, which includes end users, systems integrators and engineering firms, and OEMs. Including the suppliers, we received 141 responses, but we have removed the supplier responses from the analysis presented here because of the obvious bias. Surprisingly (or maybe not if you believe that suppliers can be their own worst critics), the filtered results do not vary greatly from those with the supplier responses.

From a geographic perspective, sixty-three percent of our non-supplier respondents were from North America. Al-most 18 percent came from Western Europe, with other responses received from regions such as China, Japan, India and Eastern Europe.

About a quarter of our non-supplier respondents were in management positions in their company, while about 20 percent were systems engineers. Other disciplines represented included plant engineering, sales, maintenance and plant operations.

We also tried to get a feel for what types of products our respondents had influence in purchasing. Most of our re-spondents had influence or were responsible for systems purchases on the system side of either process or discrete manufacturing (PLCs and DCSs). Many also had responsibility for advanced control software and process field instrumentation. Close to 42 percent of respondents were also responsible for selection of service providers. Other areas of responsibility included drives and motors, production management software, control valves, breakers, start-ers, terminal blocks and robots.